News from around california

$25M AWARDED FOR HIT-AND-RUN CRASH THAT HURT GIRL: RIVERSIDE (AP) — A Southern California jury has awarded $25 million to the family of a 4-year-old girl who was run over twice by a hit-and-run driver.

Riverside County jurors made the award Friday in a lawsuit filed against the driver by relatives of Mireyli Gomez.

Attorney Greg Owens says the girl was playing in the parking lot of an apartment complex in Rubidoux in June of 2010 when a motorist backed over her with a GMC Envoy, then pulled forward and ran over her again before speeding off.

The girl had a shattered pelvis and spent several months in the hospital.

Hugo Aguirre later pleaded guilty to misdemeanor hit-and-run causing injury. No attorney was listed in court documents for him.

MARTIAL ARTS TEACHERS HELD IN SAMURAI SWORD ATTACK: LANCASTER (AP) — Two brothers who run a Southern California martial arts school were arrested on suspicion of kidnapping an Antelope Valley teenager, torturing him with cigarettes and cutting him with samurai swords, authorities said Friday.

Ston Lee, 34, and Skoth Ly, 33, were arrested Thursday on suspicion of kidnapping, torture and cultivating marijuana while a third man, Anthony Valdizia, 36, was arrested on suspicion of being a felon with a firearm, Los Angeles County sheriff's officials said.

All three remained jailed Friday.

The brothers are suspected of kidnapping an 18-year-old man in Lancaster on Sept. 25 who was "tortured with lit cigarettes, cut with samurai swords and beaten" before being released, according to a statement from sheriff's Deputy Miguel T. Ruiz.

Investigators did not immediately release a motive for the alleged attack.

EXPLOSIVE, WEAPONS SEIZED IN CALIFORNIA HOUSE RAID: LOS ANGELES (AP) — A man has been arrested on suspicion of illegally selling weapons after authorities seized more than 200 firearms, plastic explosive and a machine gun from his Riverside County home.

The California Department of Justice said 30-year-old Victor Christian Robles face a number of state firearms violations following Thursday night's raid on his Eastvale home.

Department spokesman Nicholas Pacilio said Robles was dealing firearms, but there was no immediate indication that he intended to harm anyone.

Robles posted $150,000 bail.

PROSECUTORS TRY TO HALT SEX OFFENDER'S RELEASE: SAN DIEGO (AP) — A rapist who has served half of a 50-year sentence for a series of San Diego attacks could be freed unless prosecutors convince a court that he's too dangerous.

Prosecutors said Friday that Alvin Ray Quarles is a violent predator who should be committed to a state hospital indefinitely.

Quarles was scheduled to be released Nov. 16. However, a judge Friday set a Dec. 19 hearing on whether to release him or send him to a hospital until it's determined he's no longer a public threat. Quarles will remain in custody until that hearing.

An email message to reach Quarles' public defender Friday was not immediately returned.

During attacks in the 1980s, Quarles assaulted women at knifepoint, sometimes forcing their husbands or boyfriends to watch. He pleaded guilty in 1989 to four counts of rape, and to robbery and burglary.

Before the law was changed in 1994, the most serious offenders were entitled to credit of up to 50 percent of their sentence for good conduct, District attorney spokesman Steve Walker said. The law now limits violent felons from receiving more than a 15 percent reduction from good-time credits.

A MAN BUSTED WITH 138 LBS. POT ON I-80 AT DONNER: TRUCKEE (AP) — A California highway patrolman arrested a 46-year-old Sacramento man with 138 pounds of marijuana in his SUV after the trooper spotted him passing several vehicles on the shoulder of U.S. Interstate 80 near the Donner Summit.

Patrol PIO Peter Mann says the officer smelled marijuana in Cook's Toyota Rav 4 and conducted a probable cause search of the vehicle. Mann says he found the 138 pounds of pot in large duffel bags in the back seat along with $2,600 cash.

Cook was booked into the Nevada County substation jail in Truckee on two felony counts of possession of marijuana for sale and transportation of a drug. His bail was set Tuesday at $250,000.